Bret Lott

A very good book, I'm glad I read it. I may read it again, now that I know how everything turns out.
It is about a family struggling to survive in wartime and post WWII deep South (Mississippi) They are working hard and managing by selling pine stumps to the turpentine plant for the military, until the war ended, and their sixth child was born. A daughter with Downs Syndrome, in the days when such children were called Mongoloid, and when African Americans were called the "n" word, with no malice intended, just cultural and systemic racism.
It is a family saga, continuing through the years until Jewel, the mother, is an old woman and her children grown, except the youngest, who never grew up even though she was middle aged, physically.… (more)